COUNCILLORS called for urgent solutions to be found to Surrey Heath Borough Council’s ongoing planning crisis at a special meeting on Monday.

But the executive avoided being censured over its performance by 18 votes to 16.

Opposition councillors called the council’s leaders to account for the situation which has seen a three to four month backlog of cases hold up planning applications since April.

In a volatile debate the executive faced a challenge to resign if it could not resolve the problems, which were described as “out of control”.

The council was recently penalised for its poor performance when it received more than £400,000 less in planning delivery grant from the government than neighbouring Rushmoor and Hart councils.

But executive members defended their handling of the situation and said there was a national shortage of professional planning officers.

Council leader Cllr Moira Gibson said a consultant had been called in to recommend changes to working practices and proposals would be put forward soon.

But Liberal Democrat group leader Cllr David Whitcroft said: “The fault quite clearly lies, in my view, with the exec-utive, which has quite simply failed to resource the planning control department properly.

“The responsibility of that failure lies squarely with the executive and the portfolio holder, who have let down the officers — some of whom have suffered stress-related illnesses as a result.

“The Office of the Deputy Prime Minister has maintained that Surrey Heath will not get its full allocation of planning delivery grant.

“It will not get that until standards improve. It is effectively throwing planning delivery grant into the flames.”

The Liberal Democrats called for more money to be devoted to planning, after the council decided last month to allocate just £60,000 out of an expected surplus of £150,000 from planning application fees to the problem, and keep the rest in reserve.

Cllr Gibson said: “There will be recommendations coming forward with regard to the use of resources. We have taken the view that we needed to take a step back and look at it in a more strategic way. We need to make sure we are not throwing good money after bad.

“While not making it an excuse, I think it’s a very real problem, the shortage of planners. The Government Office of the South-East admits that there is a real shortage of planners.”

But Cllr Whitcroft said the executive’s job was to overcome the problems, adding: “The plain fact of the matter is that Rushmoor, Hart and Bracknell Forest councils have dealt with the problems that have confronted their development control departments.

“They are located within five miles of this building. So how is it that we only have four and a half planners?

“We need more of them and we don’t need to hear about the problems. What we need are some solutions.”

Cllr Bob Smith added his voice to the calls for improvement, saying: “I understand that there may be recommendations coming before the executive soon but residents are suffering today.”

The problems have been rooted in staff shortages at the council caused by planners deciding to move to the private sector or being recruited by neighbouring councils.

Two senior planning officers were made redundant during a reorganisation but councillors were told this had not directly affected the situation since neither dealt with planning applications.

In the meantime some of the department’s work has been given to private consultants to help work through the backlog.